Tag: oprah winfrey

Oprah Winfrey Final Farewell Show to Air Wednesday

The final episode of The Oprah Winfrey Show will be taped Tuesday afternoon in front of over 10,000 fans at Chicago’s United Center. Oprah Winfrey‘s last show will air on Wednesday, closing out her 25-year run in one last celebrity-filled bash.

For her final set of tapings, Oprah Winfrey has pulled out all the stops, dancing on stage with John Travolta and giving surprise trips to Australia to her entire audience. The final day of the show promises to be seriously outrageous, according to all the hype. We’ll just have to wait until tomorrow to see!

“Surprise, Oprah! A Farewell Spectacular” has featured a slew of celebrity well-wishers giving their props and thanks to Oprah Winfrey for her amazing career. The celebs aren’t shy about sharing their love for Oprah off the air either. Madonna, for example, said she likes it a lot that Oprah just “doesn’t give a shit what people think.”

Kristin Chenoweth tweeted that it was the “best night of my life” when she got to sing for Oprah. Will.i.am posted on Twitter that he is going to miss The Oprah Winfrey Show and sent her his love and thanks.

Oprah Winfrey started off in Chicago in 1984 on WLS-TV’s morning talk show A.M. Chicago. A year later the show was retooled to become The Oprah Winfrey Show and the rest is history.

Just because Oprah is finally calling curtains on her talk show doesn’t mean she will be fading out of the spotlight though. On January 1st of this year, Harpo Studios launched the Oprah Winfrey Network, so we’re sure we’ll be seeing plenty of our girl for many years to come!

Oprah Winfrey has a sister

Like many things on Oprah’s show, this sounds like a soap opera plot, but it’s actually the real deal – Oprah Winfrey recently discovered that she has a half-sister she never knew about, and they had a big, tearful reunion on the show this week.

Her sister’s name is Patricia, she’s nine years younger than Oprah, and according to Oprah, she never even knew her mother was pregnant.  It’s difficult enough to imagine what an emotional thing it must be to find your family, no matter who they end up being, but to discover that your sister is Oprah?  That’s just crazy.  It’s like winning the lottery twice in a row!

Piers Morgan tries to slam Madonna, fails

Poor Piers Morgan, whose stint as the new-and-diluted fake Larry King got off to a tepid start this week, has launched a pathetic attempt to make himself seem cool and powerful by banning Madonna from his show.  Stating that Madonna was “too vegan” to be of much interest to his television viewing audience, he said that he’d prefer to stick to people who are more relevant and current, such as Mel Gibson, Barack Obama, or Lindsay Lohan.

Considering how far from the cutting edge Morgan’s interview with Oprah was, perhaps he shouldn’t start banning people and trying to act like he’s all that until he’s established some sort of reputation as the superstar host he seems to think he is.  In fact, Madonna got the last word when she was asked what she thought about being banned by Piers Morgan – her rep simply replied, “Madonna doesn’t know who Piers Morgan is.”  Ouch.

Oprah takes her audience gifts to a new extreme

Anyone who watches Oprah is familiar with her gifts to her studio audiences.  At first she started giving her audiences things like books, but it progressed to more pricey gifts like camcorders and refrigerators and even cars.  This year, to mark the season premiere of the 25th season of Winfrey’s daytime talk show, she announced to the audience that they would each be given a free eight-day trip to Australia.  As you might imagine, the audience promptly went bonkers.

But they say there’s no such thing as a free lunch, and surprisingly it’s the Australian government who are going to be footing the bill for some of the travel arrangements.  The federal and New South Wales state governments are contributing a combined $2.8 million to help bring the American tourists in, as a ploy to help boost Australia’s ailing tourism industry.  The government has asked that the media not report the initiative with pessimism, as they see it as an investment in Australia’s future.  Nonetheless, I can hear the Aussie grumbles all the way from this side of the world.

Kitty Kelley Biography Claims Oprah Winfrey and John Tesh Were Lovers

 The new Kitty Kelley unauthorized biography of Oprah Winfrey claims the talk show queen shacked up with John Tesh when she was barely out of her teens. According to the Oprah Winfrey biography, John Tesh and Oprah were lovers and lived together briefly in the 1970s.

Oprah Winfrey (Photo: Alan Light - Source: Wikimedia Commons)
Oprah Winfrey (Photo: Alan Light – Source: Wikimedia Commons)

Kitty Kelley claims John Tesh dumped Oprah because of the “social pressure” of being in an interracial relationship. “He said one night he looked down and saw his white body next to her black body and couldn’t take it anymore,” one of Tesh’s ex-girlfriend’s allegedly told Kelley. “He walked out in the middle of the night… He told me he later felt very guilty about it.”

John TeshOprah Winfrey and John Tesh both worked in Nashville at the same time in the mid-70s. Tesh has not commented on the claim he and Oprah were lovers. Winfrey spokesperson Angela DePaul said this weekend that her client would not be commenting on the new Kitty Kelley biography.

Interestingly enough, John Tesh did appear on the 10th anniversary of Oprah Winfrey’s show in 1996. At the time, the talk show host admitted she and Tesh had one “platonic” dinner date in the past.

Honestly, we don’t see why either Oprah Winfrey or John Tesh would care about hiding a past relationship at this point. Regardless, we kind of feel like that’s their business, not ours. Kitty Kelley delights in making herself rich and famous by dissecting the lives of other people. Maybe it’s because she doesn’t really have much of a life herself.

>> Previously: Conan O’Brien New Show Will Debut on TBS


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Rosie O’Donnell Daytime TV Comeback?

Former talk show diva Rosie O’Donnell may be planning to return to daytime TV as early as fall 2011, according to media reports. O’Donnell’s return to TV could possibly coincide with the exit of daytime talk show host Oprah Winfrey from network TV.

Rosie O'Donnell (Photo: David Shankbone - Source: Wikimedia Commons)
Rosie O'Donnell (Photo: David Shankbone - Source: Wikimedia Commons)

Rosie O’Donnell has reportedly entered into a partnership with two former Warner Bros. executives and allegedly hopes to syndicate a new talk show late next year. O’Donnell has been hinting at a return to TV on her Sirius radio show over the past few weeks.

While we think it would be kind of interesting to say Rosie O’Donnell back on the air – just to see what kind of chaos ensued – we’re just not sure if it would be a successful move. Ellen DeGeneres has already taken the reins as Oprah’s successor and we don’t really need two lesbians battling it out for daytime TV ratings (especially since Ellen would win hands down). O’Donnell is also unlikely to end up back on network daytime TV considering her recent history with running off at the mouth. More than likely cable would be her destination and that’s going to make it harder to garner viewers.

Plus, Rosie O’Donnell has hopped aboard the crazy train with her totally nutball blog ranting and raving too many times since she left TV and came out. She’s definitely shown she’s got some freak not far below the surface and we’re a bit afraid of what might come out of her mouth. Unless someone can keep a very tight hold on O’Donnell’s verbal diarrhea, a new talk show could sadly prove more embarrassing for her than anything else.

A spokesperson for Rosie O’Donnell declined to comment on the rumor.

>> Previously:  Who is Rosie O’Donnell’s New Girlfriend?

Oprah Winfrey Announcement – The Show Will Not Go On

After weeks of speculation, Oprah Winfrey officially announced The Oprah Winfrey Show will go off the air in September, 2011. Oprah made the announcement Friday in a tearful statement at the end of her show.

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“After much prayer and careful thought, I decided that next season, season 25, will be the last season,” Oprah said. “I love this show… This show has been my life and I love it enough to know when it’s time to say goodbye.”

Winfrey thanked her fans for their support over the last 25 years. “These years with you, our viewers, have enriched my life beyond measure… I want you all to know my relationship with you is one that I hold very dear.”

Oprah fans shouldn’t worry they won’t be seeing the talk show diva on TV again after next year. The mega-millionaire is currently working on the launch of the Oprah Winfrey Network (OWN), a joint venture with Discovery Communications. No doubt Oprah will be showing her face there probably as frequently as she does on the cover of O Magazine.

>> Previously: Oprah Chimp Victim Guest Charla Nash Reveals Ruined Face on Air